Lucy Walker’s ‘Waste Land’ Examines Garbage as Art

In director Lucy Walker’s documentary “Waste Land,” Brooklyn-based artist Vik Muniz returns to his native Brazil to see how his life could have ended up. He photographs a group of catadores – garbage-pickers who fish out recyclables at the world’s largest garbage dump – amongst the refuse everyone else has thrown away but what they consider dear. After completing the portraits, Muniz sold them at auction and took in hundreds of thousands of dollars, which he gave back to the catadores. The film premiered at Sundance and has won multiple audience awards since then. We caught up with Walker, who also directed “Blindsight” and “Countdown to Zero,” to chat about the film.

The Wall Street Journal: Tell me about the collaboration between you and Vik on this project.

Lucy Walker: We were introduced by a friend. I had been a huge fan before and had seen his work in New York museums. The collaboration was a question of what the film was going to be. I had been obsessed with garbage for ten years. I had met a woman named Robin Nagle, who teaches a PhD seminar at NYU on garbage. I sat in her on her class and we went to visit Fresh Kills landfill. I thought it was such an amazing place. There was this crazy landscape with glass poking up and plastic bags, but it was a horrifying realization that everything we throw away comes to this place. I had heard about the landfill in Brazil and put it together as an idea. Vik talked about being poor and about doing a social project, and I just knew that the most interesting thing for us to do was garbage.

Do you feel compelled to interfere when you interact with subjects? What’s the line between artist-as-observer and artist-as-actor?

It’s such a hard call. Officially, one isn’t supposed to intervene. It’s like the Prime Directive in Star Trek. There’s no right answer, everything is about you negotiating in that situation. There are times when to not do something would be unethical. Other times, to do something would be unethical. There are certain guidelines that are industry standard, but only you can decide how to behave. There’s no limit to the responsibility you have as a documentary filmmaker to portray ordinary people. I think it’s fantastic that in the film, you see Vik arguing with his wife about whether to bring the catadores to London or not for the auction. She wants to know whether they’ll be able to go back to the landfill after. That scene deconstructs the question of Vik’s altruism so fantastically. It shows how much thought he’s given to it.

Was donating the proceeds from the portraits to the catadores always part of the plan?

Yes. So far we’ve gotten $300,000 from the portraits. We’ve also won lots of lovely film prizes that will go to them — $87,000 in total. The money’s so far bought fifteen computers, a truck and a daycare center.

Some of the pickers regard the landfill as a haven, a way to avoid prostitution and drug-running. Others say they never want to go back. As a filmmaker, is there an onus to reconcile those points of view? Or do you just need to depict them?

My job is to depict them first of all and to turn these disparate human stories into one overarching narrative. I love that everyone has a different story and approach because that chimes with my sense of life. You trace these unique journeys of these people, and I love that everyone is completely different.

How do you choose topics for your works? Do you set out to make sociopolitical documentaries?

I make films based on whatever’s the most compelling question I need answering. Each of my films explores certain questions. To be Amish or not, what’s going to happen when people climb Everest, what do we need to know about nuclear weapons. For this film it was can art change people? That’s the question the film is the literal answer to.

How did you approach the structure of “Waste Land”? There seems to be an art-within-art-within-art narrative.

It’s definitely frames within frames. The journey of filmmaking echoes the journey of photo-making. It’s about scale and starting far away, like looking at a picture and peering close at the little objects that form the picture. The film is a portrait of Vik making a portrait with the catadores, which is made out of the material they work with.

What’s going to happen to the catadores now that the landfill is set to close?

None of the other landfills is likely to let them in, even though they’re respected environmental stewards that extend the life of the landfill. It’s vitally important that they get skills training so they can move into different industries. Part of the money will go toward that.

It was touching that one of the catadores created a community library from all of the books he found in the garbage.

They have such mythic qualities. These are stories of people making an unlikely living and finding everything they need in the garbage. Apparently there’s a word in the New York Department of Sanitation that’s both noun and verb. You “mongo” things that you get out of the trash that you want to use. “This is mongo” or “I mongo’ed” it.

Speaking of, can you describe the dress you wore last night to the premiere?

It was a garbage bag with handle tie straps and a big belt. It was a big fashion hit.

“Waste Land” will be released in New York City on October 29 and on November 5 in Los Angeles.